Gm, Equinauts

A new report has revealed the UK’s illegal betting market has EXPLODED recently, with more money staked through offshore bookmakers than ever, rising from around £5 billion in 2019 to an estimated £16.6bn in 2025.

We (the writers behind this newsletter) have a little Whatsapp group made up of 7 or 8 serious punters, two pro, others just very, very sharp (most of the time). Not ONE of them bets through legitimate bookies. Maybe 300k-500k a turnover a month… now all on the black-market. That’s a lot of action.

‘Industry figures’ are blaming tighter regulation, particularly affordability checks, and there’s absolute truth in that — but let’s not kid ourselves, it’s not the only reason. A big part of the issue is bookmaker behaviour. They don’t want all customers, especially customers on a winning run. Even if they lack the foresight that they might end up getting most, if not all of it back at some point!

The affordability checks need a serious review, yes, but bookmakers need a massive regulatory kcik up the ar*se too.

The sad thing is we don’t need bookmakers. The black market wouldn’t exist at anywhere near this scale if our betting industry was built around a pari-mutuel ecosystem like those in Japan, Australia and Hong Kong thrive off.

Not sure what we mean by that?

A pari-mutuel betting system is a very simple way of betting where you don’t bet against the bookmaker — you bet against other people. So instead of a bookmaker setting fixed odds and taking profit from each bet, the “system” just collects all the money and splits it among the winners after taking a small cut.

Winners are welcome. No trader reviews. Massive liquidity. All bets taken.

One can dream…

Let’s dive in.

HEADLINE ROUNDUP

🔍AFFORDABILITY CHECKS

We wanted to expand a little on yesterday’s GamScore rant and make our position crystal clear. You can revisit yesterday’s newsletter for the full breakdown, but for those who can’t be bothered scrolling back through their inbox, here’s the short version:

Now, we’ve always been in favour of some form of gambling restrictions. There absolutely needs to be a way people’s spending, losses, or overall gambling exposure is measured because, quite simply, some people can lose their minds gambling and get themselves into serious trouble. If you don’t think that’s true, you’re either an idiot or in denial. Most people we know have a tendency to over-bet and regret it afterwards. It’s human nature.

The affordability checks in their current form are too intrusive and totally onerous as each bookmaker is obligated to request your personal financial information to allow you to spend with them. More, there is no uniformity between the bookmakers with each request likely to be different so if you are luck enough to have 5 bookie accounts, that could mean 5x different request demanding access to payslips, bank statements and every thing else they see fit.

It’s a complete joke.

So, back to our rant yesterday.

It may have been premature. Classic (she says).

If GamScore really does mean less friction and stops bookmakers getting a handle on your private parts, then maybe it’s actually a bloody good idea.

We just think the timing is terrible when the real focus should be on wider industry reform.

We absolutely hate the corporate giant bookmakers. The whole model stinks — they restrict or ban winners (which honestly should be criminal) while happily letting losing punters lose. That’s why we feel that before any new ‘pro-customer’ affordability-check app or solution is rolled out, the industry itself needs serious reform and bookmakers need to start laying bets properly again. Otherwise, bin them off.

It’s one of the reasons we’re so pro-Tote. They actually WANT the business. It really can’t be overstated just how betting-centric they are.

As for the answer to the current affordability-checks mess, we don’t pretend to have it — but something needs to happen quickly if the industry is going to survive.

We hope that all makes sense!

🌱 CHEST-ERRR WE HAVE A PROBLEM

Day 2 of Chester’s May Festival was thrown into uncertainty on yesterday after slipping horses caused concerns over unsafe ground conditions which caused a lengthy delay to racing.

The issue emerged after the opening race, when several jockeys reported horses slipping on the tight turns of the track. Riders including Jason Watson and Oisin Murphy raised concerns, prompting officials to pause proceedings and carry out an inspection.

Ground staff undertook emergency work on the surface before jockeys, trainers and stewards met to decide whether the meeting could continue:

It was looking very, very bearish for Chester, its racegoers and, well, everyone involved as racing was halted for more than an hour before officials finally confirmed the card would continue after lengthy deliberations.

Not everyone was convinced, though. Tom Marquand gave up one of his rides — on the highly touted MORSHDI — saying he lacked confidence in the safety of the track.

The delayed second race eventually passed without incident, as did the remainder of the card. Marquand, having watched his colleagues give the surface a test run, then jumped back in later on.

And honestly, if something had happened in that second race after the powerful Shaggas-Marquand combination decided not to run, it doesn’t bear thinking about for Chester — and racing in general.

Thankfully, everything was all cool but the chaotic episode did spark debate about track preparation, with some questioning whether enough water had been applied to the surface before the meeting after forecast rain failed to arrive.

It’s a tough one and we empathise with the ground staff who have a thankless job, as did most trainers who acknowledged the difficult balancing act of being prepared for all types of changing weather.

So, how is the going now?

Well, they’ve obviously watered over night…

They’re claiming it will ride ‘good to soft’, which we struggle to believe. Why? Because over the first two days, despite the official description of ‘good’, the track rode much firmer in reality — something reflected both in the race times and the number of horses seen slipping.

Surely, it will just be proper ‘good’ now? We’re not finding the sloppers yet.

💷100K PLACEPOT!

There is a £100k (MINIMUM) Placepot on offer for all three days of Chester’s May Festival.

Of all the meetings to get involved in, this could be a good one, as the draw bias means some short-priced favourites drawn poorly may be vulnerable to bigger-priced runners in better positions.

On that basis, we imagine there will be some big dividend pay-outs this week and you can play if for just £1.

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